The Ground Floor of Judaism: Scepticism and Certainty in Moses Mendelssohn ’ s Jerusalem

catechism; The Jewish rights, and constitutions do not, however, convey us a favourable opinion of this nation. We marvel at the appearance of legal scholars who constantly ignore the spirit of the law , and solely want to acknowledge its letter ; who treat seriously and extensively the frivolities and wretched trifles, for which no law giver in the whole world cares; who issue prescriptions about unending improbable cases, of which no reasonable human being would conceive. We are sur-prised to find moral teachers which they follow who constantly ignore the eternal laws of nature, and decrees and constitutions of a very arbitrary essence,which seem to have no influence what-soever on human happiness, and which have neither real morality nor immorality; were there ever teachers of religion,who took customs and ceremonies to be the sole essence of that religion , and were used to taking the outer shell and shadow of the virtue for the virtue itself, and perceiving the externality of religion for the interiority thereof [ … ] such teachers are the Jews.


Introduction
One of the central themes that Moses Mendelssohn's Jerusalemo der über religiöse Machtu nd Judentum (Jerusalem or on Religious Power and Judaism)i sp redicated upon is the notion of doubt.Y et in Jerusalem, Mendelssohn seems to employ not just one type, but rather aw ide array of varyingm odes of doubt. The following paper will set out to exploreMendelssohn'sequivocalapplication of doubtinJerusalem,and in so doing endeavour to demonstrate that he, despite his rather unfavourable view of scepticism as a 'disease of the soul' ('Krankheit der Seele'),¹ nonetheless drawsh eavilyo ni t. Indeed, this is by no meansaf oreign topic to Jewish thought: Alreadyi nt he first century CE, the JewishP latonist Philo of Alexandria resorted to Neo-Pyrrhonian and New Academics cepticism to substantiatet he ultimatem etaphysical truth of Jewish Scripture.² Similarly, we also find references to philosophical scepticism in the work of the medieval Jewish thinker Judah Halevi (1075 -1141)and the Venetian Rabbi Simone Luzzatto (?1582-1663).³ Furthermore, the Jewish intellectual tradition can be understood as aconstant interplaybetween scepticism and dog- matism. However,the ideaofphilosophical doubt has led Mendelssohn-in contrast to the aforementioned Jewish thinkers-in acompletelydifferent direction: to an outright repudiation of the pivotalp remise of Jewish philosophy, which claims that the HolyScriptures of Judaism entail eternal philosophical truths ('ewigeV ernunftwahrheiten'): Judaism boasts of no exclusive revelation of eternal truths that areindispensable to salvation, of no revealed religion in the sense in which that term is usuallyu nderstood. Revealed religion ['geoffenbarte Religion']i sone thing, revealed legislation ['geoffenbarteG esetzgebung'], another.The voice which let itself be heardonSinai on that great daydid not proclaim, 'Iamthe Eternal, your God, the necessary,independent being, omnipotent and omniscient,that recompenses men in af uture life according to their deeds.' This is the universal religion of mankind, not Judaism; […].⁴ In the following article, Iwish to argue, both systematicallyund historically-philologically, thatM endelssohn'sb asic motivation for resortingt os ceptical stances is essentiallyt wofold: He attempts to isolate the coreofJ ewish belief from philosophical doubt and at the same time expose the conceptual vulnerability of the dogmas of Christianity. The main assertion Iw illt hus develop is that Mendelssohn'se xploitation of sceptical concepts comesf rom the general apologetic impulse for writing Jerusalem. As is known, Mendelssohn formulatedthis treatise as areaction against the polemicalultimatum posed anonymouslybyAugust F. Cranz  in Das Forschen nach Lichtund Recht⁵ to either convert to Christianity or to account for his staying loyal to his Jewish faith while taking his 'enlightened' viewpoint of natural religion into account.⁶ In light of this apologetic and interreligious discourse within which Jerusalem is situated, Iw ill maintain that Mendelssohn endeavours to delineate the crucial differencesb etween Judaism and Christianity through the idea of scepticism. In the process, Iw ill set out to answer two questions: (1) To what aim does Mendelssohn utilise sceptical strategies in Jerusalem for his fundamental understandingofr eligion and philosophy, revelation and reason?( 2) What kind of dif-ferent sceptical stances does Mendelssohn make use of in Jerusalem? The answer to these questions will unfold in three essential stages. In the first part,Iwill elaborate on Mendelssohn'sunderstanding of what 'the spirit of true Judaism'⁷ is as it pertains to his harsh critique (if not sceptical undermining) of Maimonides' dogmatic and philosophical distortion of its 'ancient,original' meaning.⁸ In the second part-drawing on the perceptivea nd innovative research conducted by Gideon Freudenthal in his No Religion without Idolatry (2012)-Iw ill suggest that Mendelssohn entertains sceptical doubt concerning the nature of languagea san effective epistemic vehicle to emphasise the merits of 'the old Judaism' ('das alte Judentum'), which is primarily construed as as ystem of ceremonial laws ('Zeremonialgesetze'). In this part,l ight will be shed on an umber of theological and philosophical sources that constitute points of departure for Mendelssohn'so wn stances and discussions. Several of these sources are by no means sceptical in nature, but they still share one unifying feature: They all entail critical inclinations in one wayora nother towards language and signs.E xactlyt his common thread seemed to have been cleverlye xploited by Mendelssohn and incorporatedinto his systematic sceptical stance towards language in Jerusalem. In the concluding part,Iturn to his employmento fas ceptical viewpoint in the framework of his critical analysis of ecclesiastical law( ' Kirchenrecht') in the Kingdom of Prussia and the intolerance of the lawt owardst he Jewishp opulation.Iwill show that Mendelssohn'sd escription relies,i nt his instance, not so much on ancient scepticism, nor on the Jewish philosophicala ccount of ancient scepticism, but rather specificallyo nJ ohann M. Schröckh'sf ourth volume of his Christliche Kirchengeschichte (1777).⁹

1T he Non-Speculative Natureo fA ncient Judaism
In one of the central sections of the second part of Jerusalem,Mendelssohn seems to grapple with Cranz'ss upposition that Judaism has determineda rticles of faith ('Glaubensartikel der jüdischenR eligion').¹⁰ The wayh ep roceeds is not by straightforwardlyc riticizingC ranz, but rather by disputing Maimonides' dogmatic understanding of Judaism. The specific notion he casts doubt on is Maimonides' contention  Mendelssohn,Jerusalem,100 (JubA 8,167) nel (1437-1508), strongly attest to their inauthentic core. With reference to this very passage, Warren Zev Harvey has insightfullypointed out the similaritybetween Mendelssohn and these medieval anti-Maimonidean thinkers,f irst and foremost Ḥasdai Crescas,w ith respect to their undogmatic conception of Judaism.¹³ As peculative mindset that poses an even greater threat to authentic Judaism is the kabbalistic one, which, accordingt oM endelssohn, reduces the entire Scripturet o' fundamental doctrines' ('Fundamentallehren')o fa nu tterlys peculative nature.¹⁴ However,m yr eadingo ft his central passagee mphasises another aspect: These importantthinkers demonstratedtoMendelssohn exactlyhow ametaphysical understanding of HolyScripture not onlyfailstounderpin the absolutetruth of Jewish belief, but has the quite counterproductive effect of making Judaism susceptible to philosophical doubt and thus jeopardizingt he whole conceptual construct of its  Mendelssohn,Jerusalem,101 (JubA 8,167 tradition. This readingi ss tronglyr einforced when we take, for example, Mendelssohn'so wn reiteration of the main thesis of Jerusalem into consideration-Judaism is not ar evealed religion ('geoffenbarteR eligion'), but rather revealedl egislation ('geoffenbarte Gesetzgebung')-¹⁵ in An die Freunde Lessings (1786), which he emphasises in conjunction with scepticism and common sense: When Italk of rational conviction, however,a nd Iwant to presuppose this as undoubted in Judaism, the talk is not about metaphysical argumentation as we areu sed to carryingi to ni n books,n ot about pedanticd emonstrations that all meet the test of the subtlest skepticism, but about the claims and judgments of as imple, sound commonsense, which looks things right in the eyea nd reflects calmly.¹⁶ Mendelssohn makes it abundantlyc lear that he wishest oe stablish the Jewish religion as aposition that is beyond doubt ('unbezweifelt'); i. e. astance that,incontrast to metaphysical reasoning( ' metaphysische Argumentation'), does not have to withstand the penetrating attacks of philosophical scepticism.¹⁷ Spinoza'sunrelentinglyharsh critique in his Tractatus Theologico-Politicus (TTP) of Maimonides' unscientificexegetical method might also have had an effect on this view held by Mendelssohn.¹⁸ Moreover,the scientific approach applied to biblical exegesisa dvocated by Spinoza in the TTP-to attempt,t hrough newlyd evelopedp hi-  Mendelssohn,Jerusalem,97(JubA 8,157 Gottlieb,Faith and Freedom,[9][10][11][12] lological tools,tounearth the original meaning of Scripture, unfiltered by theological premises-gained as trongf oothold in the intellectual Protestant circlesi nt he German-speakingworld of the eighteenth century and wasfurther cultivated. Protestant philologists of Biblical Hebrew,such as JohannW .Meiner (1723 -1789), Robert Lowth (1710 -1787), Johann D. Michalis (1717-1791), Johann G. Herder (1744 -1803) and Johann G. Eichhorn (1752 -1827), seem to have had ag reat impact on Mendelssohn's perception of the Hebrew Bible as an aestheticp iece of writing.¹⁹ The progress in the field of Biblical Hebrew could have facilitated Mendelssohn'su ncovering of the philological shortcomingso ft he presuppositions upon which much of Jewish philosophyi sgrounded. Mendelssohn was not onlyf amiliar with Spinoza'sc ritique of Maimonides, but also with that of Protestant authors. If we take, for example, the first volume of Heinrich Corrodi's Kritische Geschichte des Chiliasmus (1781), ab ook Mendelssohn was familiar with,²⁰ we find afiercecritique of Maimonides' as nothing less than a 'fraudulent' Aristotelian exegesis of JewishS cripture: Maimonides deceives himself, insofar as he does not derive his philosophyf romJ ewish Scriptures, but from Aristotle; this was also done by those, who solelyrecognised areasonablesystem of philosophya nd not that of the sinister kabbalistic webo fd reams. Fort hey didn'tf ind what they were lookingf or in the philosophyo ft heir nation.²¹ The attitude of these theologians of the German-speaking world towards the exegetical rabbinic tradition as awhole was very deprecatory,since it made speculative assumptions superimposed on JewishScripture. In the section "Talmud und Rabbinen" (III. §341: "Schriften der Rabbinen")o fE ichhorn'sp ioneering three-volume Einleitung ins Alte Testament (1780 -1783), which Mendelssohn possessed in its entirety in his library,²² he assesses their Scriptural interpretation as unscientific. Forthis reason, he emphasises that his analysis of the Biblical corpus will not depend on their uncritical judgments.²³ It is, of course, plausible that the 'nervensaftverzehrende' Kri- tik der reinen Vernunft (KrV)²⁴ 'des alles zermalmenden Kants,'²⁵ published onlyt wo years prior to Jerusalem in 1781,illustrated to Mendelssohn the striking epistemological limitations of speculative metaphysics and the implications this insight might have on a Judaism that is strongly premised on theoretical notions.²⁶

2S cepticisma nd the Non-Verbality of Mosaic Law
Subsequently,M endelssohn considerablyw idens the scope of the problem concerning theological dogmatism within the framework of Judaism: He proceedst od oubt entirelythe capacity of the fixed written and spoken wordasasymbol for mediating the true lively essence of Judaism and metaphysical truth. The immediate reason for his addressing this issue seems to be rooted in the following statement Cranz made in the opening of Das Forschen nach Lichtu nd Recht: This figurative expression [i. e. of Moses coveringh is radiant face] probablys ignifies nothing morethan that therewas atime when the eyes of as-yet-unenlightenednations werestill unable to bear the truth pure and whole, and that therecame another time when people dared to take a longer glimpse at the bright sun and considered themselvess trong enough to throwa wayt he veil, and, speakingf rankly, to teach in an unconcealed manner what had otherwise only been cloaked in hieroglyphics and moret han halfwayv eiled in figurative expressions.²⁷ In this quotation, Cranz attempts to describe the conceptual progression Christianity has made with respect to Judaism, the belief system it evolvedfrom: 'In the period of the so-called New Testament,t he Christians boasted of seeing Moses with his face uncovered.'²⁸ This passager evolvesa round the New Testament metaphoric ('bildli- che Vorstellungsart')in2Corinthians 3:13 -18, which is in turn an allusion to the radiant face of the Jewishlawgiverdepicted in Exodus 34:29 -35the point being that Jewishb elief has onlya no blique access to the Godlym ysteries, in contrast to the Christian faith, which gains unmediated insight into these revealedt ruths.²⁹ Cranz seems to explicate this metaphor,which he regards as an insinuation of the spiritual backwardness of Judaism, which can grasp God onlyi nh is concealment (Deus absconditus), in terms of the semiotic notion conveyedin2Corinthians 3:6: Forthe letter kills, but the Spirit gives life (τὸ γὰργ ρ ά μμα ἀποκτέννει, τὸ δὲ πνεῦμα ζῳοποιεῖ).³⁰ Cranz impliest hatJ ewish faith is by definition reliant upon the intermediation of signs in the form of the figurative Biblical Hebrew language( ' in Hieroglyphen kleidete, und in figürlichen Vorstellungsarten'). It is quite apparent that Mendelssohn's Jerusalem directlyq uarrels with Cranz'sC hristocentric apprehension of Judaism as conveyedi nt he above-mentionedp assageo nt he veiled face of the Jewishl awgiver. Tworeasons present themselvesfor this claim: (1) Mendelssohn also alludes to hieroglyphs in juxtaposition with Biblical Hebrew as an epistemological obstacle to the original unmediated truths of the Sinaitic revelation.³¹ (2)H ee mploys the Pauline symbols of dead letter ('toter Buchstabe')a nd lively spirit ('lebendiger Geist')i n2 Corinthians 3:6a tt he centre of his depiction of the true nonverbal, spiritual nature of Judaism as ceremonial law( ' Zeremonialgesetz').³² It seems, however,tob eabit perplexingt hat Cranz juxtaposes the Biblical Hebrew,s poken by the veiled Moses to the Israelites,with hieroglyphs. Apossible explanationcan be traced back to De vita Moysis I23ofPhilo of Alexandria, which describes how Moses in his adolescencewas instructed by knowledgeable Egyptians in the philosophye xpressed in symbols (ἡ διὰ συμβόλων φιλοσοφία), as exhibited in the pictorial characters commonlyr eferred to as hieroglyphs (ἱερὰ γράμματα). Cranz, at rained theologian from the University of Halle,³³ was surelya cquainted to some extent with the bodyo ft hought of the Jewish Alexandrian. Moreover,i n 1778,just four years prior to Cranz'sr esponsetoMendelssohn's Preface to Menasseh  try,94-95,106,116 -117, 121-124, 250, 273-275, and 278-279; cf (1732), aw orkh ep ossessed in folio format in his library.⁴¹ Spencer took it upon himself, in the words of JanA ssmann, to provet he 'Egyptian origin of the ritual laws of the Hebrews.'⁴² Assmann regards this short Philonic passage as decisive for Spencer'sE gyptian portrayal of Moses: Moses certainlyknew hieroglyphic writing, which Spencer takes to be asecret codebywhich the Egyptian priests transmitted their wisdom to the initiated. His sources include Philo of Alexandria, De Vita Mosis,book 1, where we read that Moses learned from his Egyptian masters, among other subjects, tend ia symbolon philosophian.⁴³ Our proposed readingi ss ubstantiated even further if we account for the fact that Cranz probablyr eacted not onlyt oM endelssohn's Vorrede,t he German translation of Menasseh BenI srael's Vindicia Judaeorum (1656),b ut also to the contents of the translated essayi tself. This is duet ot he fact that Philo occupies ac rucial position in Rettung der Juden, written by Spinoza'sAmsterdam rabbi, which makes numerous references to the historical descriptions of the Jewish Alexandrian to illustrate the hardships Jews endured under the rule of the Roman Empire.⁴⁴ Forpreciselythis reason, Mendelssohn makest he following observation regardingB en Israel'sd rawing on Philo (and Josephus Flavius): If in this passage we should understand by empire of honour acertain empireinthe world, then the onlypossible thingthat could be meant is the reign of the Roman Empire, under which the Jews in those days livedand during which this prayerwas introduced. How can this, however,be reconciled with the assertion of our Rabbi [i. e. Menasseh BenI srael], which demonstrates this from passages of Josephus and Philo, namelyt hat the Jews sacrificed and prayedf or the wellbeingo ft he Roman emperor?I ndeed, according to the dictum of the rabbis the sin altogether, but not the sinner,s hould be anathematised⁴⁵.⁴⁶ Mendelssohn does not merelyr eaffirm Cranz'st heological critique concerning the metaphorical languageo fa ncient Hebrew,b ut further develops this line of thought into awell-thought-out sceptical stance in regardtothe epistemic statusoflanguage altogether: Doctrines and laws,c onvictions and actions.T he twof ormer weren ot connected to words or written characters which always remaint he same, for all men and all times,a mid all the revolutions of language, morals, manners,a nd conditions,w ordsa nd characters which invariably present the same rigid forms,i ntow hich we cannot forceo ur concepts without disfiguring them.
[…]T he ceremonial lawi tself is ak ind of livings cript,r ousing the mind and heart,f ull of meaning, never ceasing to inspire contemplation and to provide the occasion and opportunity for oral instruction. Gideon Freudenthal has convincingly shown that this sceptical position towards languagea dvocatedf or by Mendelssohn is not onlyunique to his Jerusalem but constitutes as ystematic philosophical viewpoint of his later years which also correlates with his common-sense tendency:  See Babylonian Talmud, Berakhot 10a. Cf. Mendelssohn,Jerusalem,[124][125]190): 'And if this is the case, Ic annot fear such ac ondition; nor can Iw ish for ar evelation [assuringm e] that I shall never be placed in this condition of magnanimous benevolencewhich brings felicity to my fellow creatures and myself. What Ih avet of ear is sin itself.'  Ibidem,3 0-31 (fn. *; my translation and emphasis). Cf. JubA 8, 48: 'Wenn in dieser Stelle unter Reiche des Stoltzesein gewisses Reich aufErdenverstanden werden soll; so kannwohlkeinanderes, als das Römische gemeinet seyn, unterdessen Druckedie Juden damals lebten, als dieses Gebet eingeführet worden. Wier äumt sich dieses aber mit dem, was unser Rabbi in der Folgeb ehauptet,und durchS tellen aus dem Josephus und Philo beweiset,d aß nehmlich die Juden für das Wohl der römischen Kaiser und des Reichs geopfert und Gebetea ngestellet?J a, nach dem Ausspruch der Rabinen überhaupt soll der Sünde, aber nicht dem Sünder geflucht werden' (mye mphasis). And yetreaders cannot ignore his repeated advocacyofcommon sense or sound reason and his reservations concerningm etaphysicsa ss uch. Scholars wished to attenuatet his inconsistency and suggestedt hat at first Mendelssohnw as aW olffian metaphysician but that he grewe ver mores ceptical regarding metaphysicsa nd morei nclined to commons ense.⁴⁸ As Freudenthal argues, Mendelssohn is to be regarded as 'acommon-sense philosopher and sceptic in metaphysics,'⁴⁹ who became increasingly doubtful of 'the ability of languaget oa dequately represent and to help generate truth transcendingc ommon-sense knowledge of the empirical world.'⁵⁰ Mendelssohn'sa pprehension of Judaism is nothing shorto fp uzzling:H ebrew Scripture, when taken for the absolute truth, leads to idolatry.⁵¹ Iwould like to make five observations regarding the quotation at hand: 1) Mendelssohn'ssceptical evaluation of language, in all likelihood, drawsupon Plato's Schriftkritik in the Phaedrus (274b-278e), wherePlato puts the following statement into the mouth of Socrates: Writing, Phaedrus,has this strange quality,and is very like painting; for the creatureso fpainting stand likelivingbeings,but if one asks them aquestion, they preserveasolemn silence. And so it is with written words; youm ight think they spokea si ft hey had intelligence, but if you question them, wishingt ok now about their sayings,t hey always sayo nlyo ne and the same thing. And every word, when once it is written, is bandied about,alikeamongthose who understand and those who have no interest in it,and it knows not to whom to speak or not to speak; when ill-treated or unjustlyr eviled it always needs its father to help it; for it has no power to protect or help itself. (Phdr. 275d4-e5)⁵² Meiners'sremark would accordingly be asort of confirmation of my hypothesisthat the need for writtenc haracters was the first cause of idolatry.Inj udgingt he religious ideas of an ation that is otherwise;' see Mendelssohn,Jerusalem,113 (JubA 8,179); see Alexander Altmann'sc ommentary, Jerusalem,27. Ib elieveM endelssohn is alluding to another passage of Meiners than the one suggested by Alexander Altmann: '[…]: dringtman aber tiefer ein, so findet man den vollständigsten Stammbaum der Abgötterey, eine ununterbrochene Folge, und leicht begreiflich Zeugung aller Artenv on Irrthümern, die so wie sie sind, nothwendig auseinander entstehen mußten. Die Grundbegriffe dieser ganzen Irr-Theorie gründeten sich in der Lage und Beschaffenheit des Landes,inder Lebensart der Einwohner.
[ … ]: diese verbunden mit den Hieroglyphen konnten keinena ndern, als einen solchen Zustand der Gelehrsamkeit erzeugen;' see Meiners, Versuch über die Religionsgeschichte der ältesten Völker,6 2.  Plato, Euthyphro,A pology,C rito,P haedo,P haedrus,trans. The main similarityi nt his respect between Mendelssohn and Plato is grounded on the almostidentical dichotomybetween the living word(spoken) and the inanimate one (written), which both equate with an image. In Phdr. 276a, we read: 'Youm ean the living and breathingw ord[ λ ό γον … ζῶντα καὶἔ μψυχον]o fh im who knows, of which the written wordmay justlybecalled the image[ ε ἴδωλον].'⁵³ In an analogous manner,M endelssohn juxtaposes written languagea s' permanent signs' ('fortdauernde Zeichen')w ith the notion of an image: We have seen how difficultitistopreservethe abstract ideas of religion amongmen by means of permanents igns. Imagesa nd hieroglyphics ['Bilder und Bilderschrift']l ead to superstition and idolatry,and our alphabetical script makes man too speculative.Itdisplays the symbolic knowledge of things and their relations too openlyonthe surface; it spares us the effort of penetrating and searching, and creates too wide ad ivision betwe[e]n doctrine and life.⁵⁴ Mendelssohn'se xplicit and overtlya pprovingr eferences,i nt his very section, to Meiners' Versuch über die Religionsgeschichte der ältesten Völker,b esondersd er Egyptier (1775)⁵⁵ solidifies our hypothesis further,s ince the author makes recourse in this work to Plato'sc ritique of written language. The philosopher and historian Christoph Meiners (1747-1810) partiallyt ranslatesa nd then comments on Socrates' portrayal of Thamus' condemnation of Theuth'sinvention of letters (γράμματα)(Phdr. 274c5 -275b2).⁵⁶ 2) Mendelssohn'si nnovative solution to this problem, the ceremonial lawp erceivedas'living script,' could also be linked to the Platonic Schriftkritik in the Phaedrus: If our earlier suspicion is correct as to the impact Philo's De vita Moysis had on Mendelssohn'sperception of Judaism, then one should at this juncturebear in mind Philo'sPlatonic depiction of Mosaic law, which is unequivocallypredicated on Plato's  Meiners, Versuch über die Religionsgeschichte der ältesten Völker,208 -209: 'Ichh abe vone inem alten Gottei nN aukraties [Ναύκρατιν]g ehört,d essen (δαιμονος)N ahme Theuth heist,d aß er nicht nur die Kunst zu zählen, sondern auch die Kunst zu rechnen, die Geometrie, Astronomie, Schriftzeichen, nebst vielen Arten vonSpielen erfunden habe. Er soll zu den Zeitendes in Theben wohnenden, und über ganzE gyptenh erschenden Königs Thamus gelebt,u nd ihm in einer Unterredung, ausser seinen übrigenK ünsten, die Kunstzuschreiben, als eine der heilsamstenHülfsmittel und Unterstützungend es Gedächtnisses,e mpfohlen haben, gegen welchel etztered er König aber mehrereE inwürfe machte. Sokrates rückt die Disputation des Theuths und Thamus,und die Gründe vonbeyden Seiten ein; es ist sonderbar,was man in diesen beyden Stellen alles übersehen hat' (mye mphasis). Fora moredetailed discussion, see Thomas A. Szlezák, Platon und die Schriftlichkeit der Philosophie: Interpretationen zu den frühen und mittleren Dialogen (Berlin and New York: De Gruyter, 1985). λόγος ζῶνκαὶἔμψυχος (Phdr. 276a8). In Mos.1.162,Philo designates the JewishLawgivera st he personification of the rationala nd living law( ν ό μος ἔμψυχόςτ εκ α ὶ λογικὸς).⁵⁷ The ideal figure of Moses serves the JewishP latonist as the prime example, through which he illustrates this aspect: They know this wellwho readthe sacredbooks,which, unless he was such as we have said, he would never have composed under God'sguidanceand handed on for the use of those who are worthytouse them, to be their fairest possession, likenesses and copies of the patterns enshrined in the soul, as also are the laws set beforeusinthese books, which shew so clearly the said virtues. (Mos. 2.11)⁵⁸ Philo applies Plato'scritical analysis of literallanguagetohis spiritual conception of Jewishlaw.This motif is quite acommon one in Philo'sJewish Platonism. Accordingly,the biblical patriarchs, Abraham, Isaaca nd Jacob, alsod idn'tr equiret he written laws (νόμων γραφή), since they all embodied the ἔμψυχοι καὶ λογικοὶ νόμοι in their souls.⁵⁹ We find as imilar explanation in Mendelssohn's Jerusalem: And now Iamable to explain moreclearlymysurmise about the purpose of the ceremonial law in Judaism. The forefathers of our nation, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, remained faithful to the Eternal, and soughttopreserveamongtheir families and descendants pureconcepts of religion, far removed from all idolatry.⁶⁰ Philo strives ipso facto to accentuate the aliveness of the Godly unwritten law( ἄ γραφος νόμος), in order to unearth its rational and undoubtable coreasrational content intrinsic to the human soul. This is very similar to the conceptual movem ade by Mendelssohn in Jerusalem with regard to the spiritual and dynamic Zeremonialgesetze. In his important article "Das Zeremoniell als Zeichensprache," Daniel Krochmal- The German translation of Mendelssohn'se dition of De vita Moysis reads as follows: 'Vielleicht aber hat auch die göttliche VorsehungMosen lange vorher zu einem lebendigen und vernünftigen Gesetze gemacht,weil er einst ein Gesetzgeber werden sollte, und ihn im Voraus, ehe er es sich noch selbst in die Gedanken kommen ließ, dazu bestimmte;' see Gottesgelahrheit,7 0-71 (mye mphasis). Cf. Mos.2 .4 (νόμον ἔμψυχον)t ranslated in Gottesgelahrheit,1 46: 'ein lebendigesG esetz.'  PLCL 6.455 -457(my emphasis). Forthe German translation of this passage read by Mendelssohn, see: 'Es wissen aber diejenigen, welche die heiligen Bücher lesen, daß er diese nicht durch göttlichen Eingebungwürde haben schreiben, noch denen, die sich dergleichen Güter zu bedienen wissen, das schönsteB ild des vollkommensten Wesens, das jemals eine Seele gezieret hat, von welchem die bekanntgemachten Gesetze Abrisse und Nachahmungen sind, in denen man die vorher genannten Tugenden deutlich erblicket,hinterlassen können, wenn er nicht ein so vollkommener Mann gewesenwäre.' (Gottesgelahrheit,1 49 -150;m yemphasis). Cf. Mendelssohn,Jerusalem,128 (JubA 8,191): 'Das aller-höchsteW esen hat sie [i. e. ewigeWahrheiten] allen vernünftigen Geschöpfen durch Sache und Begriff geoffenbaret, mit einer Schrift in die Seele geschrieben,die zu allen Zeitenund an allen Orten leserlich und verständlich ist' (mye mphasis). Cf. Krochmalnik, "Das Zeremoniell als Zeichensprache," 267-273.  Abr.5-6; Decal. 1.  Mendelssohn,Jerusalem,[117][118]183). nik stresses the rationality at the bottom of Mendelssohn'sidea of ceremoniallaw as adistinct type of sign languageofthe religion of reason ('besondere Zeichensprache der Vernunftreligion'):⁶¹ Mendelssohnspricht dem Judentum einen religiösen Lehrgehalt nicht ab;nur daß es sich dabei nicht um eine besondereDoktrin handelt, sondern um eine vernünftige Weisung, die durch be-sondereZeremonien und die an sie anknüpfendemaieutische Unterweisungvermittelt wird. Das Judentum zeichnet sich nicht durch eine besondereLehre,sondern durch ein besonderes Medium der Vernunft aus.⁶² Thus, this Platonic rationalisation of Mosaic lawu nderlying Mendelssohn'sZ e remonialgesetz resembles, in its objective,that of Philo. Freudenthal aptlyelucidates this aim as it pertains to Mendelssohn: 'The ceremonies of Judaism have apractical function similar to philosophy: they help buttress truths of reason against doubts.'⁶³ 3) As previouslym entioned, Mendelssohn'se mployment of the dichotomyb etween the inanimate word( ' toter Buchstabe')a nd the living spirit ('lebendiger Geist')n ot onlyc orresponds to Plato, but also and af ortiori to Paul accordingt o2 Corinthians 3:6.⁶⁴ This can be demonstrated by juxtaposing ap assageb yM endelssohn with an excerpt from Lessing'sG ermant ranslation of Juan Huarte de San Juan's TheE xamination of Men'sW its (Prüfung der Köpfe zu den Wissenschaften; 1752),awork that Mendelssohn apparentlyu sedf or his own depiction:  It seems almostbeyond doubtthat Mendelssohn relies,inthese central passages out of Jerusalem, on Lessing'st ranslation of Huarte'sc haracterisation of the solicitor ('Rechtsgelehrter')i nt he eleventh section of his book.⁶⁷ The main feature of the solicitor is his strongdependency on the literal letters of the law. These 'Rechtsgelehrten' as literalists (Litterati)are then contrasted by Huarte to biblical exegetes ('Gottesgelehrten'), who have the livelyspirit as the guiding principle of their enquiry.Huarte goes on to make ad istinction between incompetent legal scholars and competent ones, the former more reliant on the faculty of memory ('Gedächtnis'), the latter predominantlyonthe faculty of reason ('Verstand').⁶⁸ He then turns to implicitly equate the incompetent 'Gottesgelehrten' thatconstrain their whole being to the prosaic letters of the laww ith the negative mindset of Jews as ap rime example of Litterati: All which breedeth an alteration in the decision of the law, and if the judge or pleader be not endowed with discourse, to gather out of the law, or to take away or adjoine that which the laws elfe doth not expresse in words,h es hall commit manie errors in followingt he letter:f or it hath been said that the words of the lawa re not to be takena fter the Jewish manner,t hat is, to construe onelyt he letter,a nd so taket he sense.⁶⁹ Stumblingupon such apassagewritten by none other than his close friend Lessing, who, accordingtohis ownaccount,revered Huarte'sscientific method of exploration  The title of this section, Huarte, Prüfung der Köpfe,200,reads as follows: 'Worinne erwiesen wird, daß der theoretische Theil der Rechtsgelahrsamkeit dem Gedächtnisse, der practische Theil, das Amt nämlich der Advocaten und Richter,dem Verstande, die Regierung, aber des Staats der Einbildungskraft zugehöre.'  Ibidem,2 10 -211a nd 213.  Juan Huarte de San Juan, TheExamination of Mens Wits,trans.RichardCarew (London: Adam F. Slip, for RichardW atkins,1 594):157-158 (mye mphasis). Fort he German translation Mendelssohn used, see: 'thereof verba legis non suntc apienda iudaice. Das ist: die Worted es Gesetzesm üssen nicht aufjüdische Art erklärt werden. Diese jüdische Art aber bestehet darinne, daß man eine grammatikalische Zergliederungdamit anstellt und den buchstäblichen Sinne herauszieht;' see Huarte, Prüfung der Köpfe,2 11 (mye mphasis). by means of unbiased freet houghta lone,⁷⁰ must have left ad eep impression on Mendelssohn as he sawh ow his Jewish faith was being misrepresented. Certainly, this was not the first time Mendelssohn encountered such acritical evaluation of Judaism with respect to the Pauline distinction between the dead letter and the living spirit.F or example, in Kritische Geschichte des Chiliasmus of Corrodi, ar enowned Leibniz-Wolffian adherent to the enlightened 'Vernunftreligion',w ef ind as imilar negative assessment regarding Judaism as solelyaspiritless 'Zeremonialreligion': The Jewish rights,and constitutions do not,however,conveyusafavourable opinion of this nation. We marvel at the appearance of legal scholars whoc onstantlyi gnore the spirit of the law, and solelywant to acknowledge its letter;who treat seriouslyand extensively the frivolities and wretched trifles,for which no lawgiver in the whole world cares; whoissue prescriptions about unendingi mprobable cases,ofw hich no reasonableh uman beingw ould conceive.Wea re surprised to find moral teachers which they follow whoconstantlyignore the eternal laws of nature, and decrees and constitutions of avery arbitrary essence, which seem to have no influencewhatsoever on human happiness,a nd which have neither real morality nor immorality;w eret here ever teachers of religion, whotook customs and ceremonies to be the sole essenceofthat religion, and were used to takingt he outers hell and shadow of the virtue for the virtue itself, and perceivingt he externality of religion for the interiority thereof […]s uch teachers are the Jews.⁷¹ Mendelssohn'sm anner of dealing with these Christian prejudices is innovative.H e inverts the Christocentric readingof2C orinthians 3:6c ompletelya nd givesi taJ ewish twist: Henceforth,itisJ udaism in its ancientoriginal meaning that is the undogmatic religion of spirit,which does not rest on inanimate letters.M endelssohn also does not retreat from the notion of Mosaic law. On the contrary:The dynamic nature of Mosaic 'Zeremonialgesetze' is preciselyw hat givesJ udaism its aliveness and frees it from being dependent upon the literal sense of Hebrew Scripture.⁷² In the closing  Gotthold E. Lessing, "Vorrede des Uebersetzers," in Huarte, Prüfung der Köpfe zu den Wissenschaften,[ 6b]: '[…]e rb eurtheiltu nd treibta lles aufe ine besondereA rt,e re ntdecket alle seine Gedanken frey und ist sich selbst sein eignerF ührer.' Cf. Catani, "Prüfungd er Köpfe zu den Wissenschaften," 31-32.  Corrodi, Kritische Geschichte des Chiliasmus,9 2-93 (myt ranslation): 'Die jüdischen Rechte, und Satzungenb ringenu ns indeß keine günstigere Meinungv om Charakter dieser Nation bey.Wir wundern uns, Rechtsgelehrtez us ehen, die den Geist des Gesetzes beständig ausd en Augen setzen, und seinen Buchstaben allein gehalten wissen wollen, die Frivolitäten, und nichtswürdige Kleinigkeiten, um die sich kein Gesetzgeber in der Welt bekümmert,ernsthaft und weitläuftig abhandeln, die über unendlichunwahrscheinliche Fälle, an die kein vernünftigerMensch denken wird, Verordnungen machen. Wirw undern uns Sittenlehrer zu finden, die die ewigenN aturgesetze unaufhörlich ausd en Augen setzen, und Verordnungen, und Satzungen, die ganz willkürlich sind, und vong anzk einem Einfluß aufdie menschliche Glückseligkeit scheinen,keine würkliche Sittlichkeit,oder Unsittlichkeit haben, an ihreStelle setzen; gabesjemals Lehrerder Religion, welche Gebräuche und Ceremonien für das Wesen derselben nehmen,und sich gewohnthaben, die Schaale und den Schatten der Tugend für die Tugend selbst,und die äußere Seitefür das Innwendigeder Religion anzusehen,[…]; so sind die Juden solche Lehrer' (mye mphasis).  Forthe influence of Wolffian philosophyonMendelssohn'sconception of the ceremonial law, see Krochmalnik, "Das Zeremoniell als Zeichensprache," 255-259. part of Jerusalem,M endelssohn places Jesus of Nazareth in the Jewish tradition of Halakha,f or he 'is in completea greement not onlyw ith Scripture, but also with the tradition.'⁷³ Mendelssohn would scarcelyh aveaproblem making the same conceptual move with the founding figure of Christianity,P aul, who does not speak of the abolition of Mosaic law, but rather,like Jesus (Matthew 5:17: πληρῶσαι), of its spiritual fulfilment (Romans1 3:10: πλήρωμα … νόμου). In sum, Mendelssohn attempts to break the reductionist equation of Jewishr eligion (spirit)w ith its Scriptural texts (letters), as tance he wasa lreadyf amiliar with from Lessing'sf amoust heological axiom for Christianity (1778): 'The letter is not the spirit,a nd the Bible is not religion.'⁷⁴ 4) Johann G. Herder has not been paid sufficient attention to his influenceo n Mendelssohn'sg rowings cepticism towards languagea nd its innate shortcomings.⁷⁵ As Freudenthal has persuasivelys hown, Mendelssohn'sg rowingd oubt concerning the aptness of languagef or articulating metaphysical truths is not merelyatransitional position we accidentallycome across in Jerusalem,but rather constitutes asystematic philosophicals tance of his latery ears that is also elaborated on in his Morgenstunden oder Vorlesungen über das DaseynGottes (1785).⁷⁶ Herder'sspecial appeal to Mendelssohn in this regardp robablys tems from the fact thath en ot onlyd ealt with the pure theoretical elements of language, but also with an aesthetic analysis of Biblical Hebrew.⁷⁷ He even personallyr eviewed in av ery favourable mannerH erder'swork on languagetheory, Abhandlung über den Ursprung der Sprache (1772), in Friedrich Nikolai's Allgemeine deutsche Bibliothek 19.2 (1773).⁷⁸ In Herder's Abhandlung über den Ursprung der Sprache,w hereh ee valuates languagea saprofane  Mendelssohn,Jerusalem,134 (JubA 8,199). See Alexander Altmann'scommentary: Jerusalem,239. Cf. Oswald Bayer, "Der Mensch als Pflichtträger der Natur Naturrecht und Gesellschaftsvertrag in der Kontroverse zwischen Hamann und Mendelssohn," in Mendelssohn und die Kreiseseiner Wirksamkeit, eds.Michael Albrecht,Eva J. Engel and Norbert Hinske(Tübingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag,1994) and animalistic product of human spirit ('überall Spuren vomG anged es menschlichen Geistes!'),⁷⁹ he voices considerable doubt regarding the adequacy of artificial philosophical language, giveni ts arbitrariness, for conveying absolute truths.⁸⁰ The animalistic origin ('tierischer Ursprung')oflanguagealso pertains, as Herder argues, to the so-called GodlylanguageofBiblical Hebrew.The writing style of this ancient languageintuitivelyindicatesthis very fact,since it entirelycontradictsthe demands of common sense: This manner of writingissocontrary to the course of sound reason-of writingthe nonessential and omittingthe essential-that it would be incomprehensible to the grammarians,ifthe grammarians werea ccustomed to comprehend.⁸¹ This sceptical attitude towards Biblical Hebrew as al anguagec ould account for Herder'sshifting to explore the aesthetic dimensions of Hebrew Scripture. In his poetological analysis of the Hebrew Bible in VomGeist der Ebräischen Poesie (1782), he constantlyhighlights sublimeness as akey feature of biblical poetic language('Erhabenheit der Poesie'). This line of interpretation seems to mainlybearesultofthe preliminarys tudy De sacrap oesi hebraeorum praelectiones academicae oxonii habitae (1753), conducted by Robert Lowth, and of the extensive reception in the Enlightenment of Pseudo-Longinus' ancientpoetological essay On the Sublime (περὶὕψους).⁸² Very similar observations werealreadymadebyMendelssohn between 1757 and 1758 in his review articles Betrachtungen ueberd as Erhabene und Naive in den schönen Wissenschaften (1758)⁸³ and De sacrap oesi Hebraeorum, praelectiones academicae Oxonii habitae, aRoberto Lowth (1757),⁸⁴ in which he favourablyevaluatesboth Pseu-do-Longinus' On the Sublime as well as Lowth'sLatin lectures on the poetical nature of Scriptural Hebrew.⁸⁵ Having said that, Herder'sstance towardslanguageingeneral and Biblical Hebrew in particular could have still helpedf orm some of Mendelssohn'sc ritical tendencies in Jerusalem: LikeH erder,h ew as critical of language and sawa nu nbridgeable gapb etween arbitrary linguistic signs and that which they aim to signify.⁸⁶ Herder'st reatment of Biblical Hebrew as ad eficient language with clear limitations and am ere derivative of the human spirit could have also led him to rule out the possibility of HolyS cripture entailing absolutephilosophical truths. Mendelssohn also considered languagei na ll its relativity as ac riterion for evaluatingt he varying Bildungsniveaus of nations: The Greeks had both culture and enlightenment.They were an educated nation just as their languageisaneducated language. -Generally, the languageofapeople is the best indication of its education, of its culture as well as its enlightenment,i nt erms of both its extent and its strength.⁸⁷ It is therefore hardlys urprising that Mendelssohn juxtaposes the sublime poetical languageo fB iblical Hebrew with the classic literature of ancient Greek and Roman poetso ft he stature of Homer and Virgil and implies the morals uperiority of the former.⁸⁸ The aesthetic approach is the manner in which Mendelssohn attempted to exhaust much of the lost meaningoft he Hebrew Bible without resorting to unsubstantiated presuppositions of wishful thinking.⁸⁹ 5) Mendelssohn'ss ceptical analysis of semiotics mayv ery well alsob ed irectly influenced by the Neo-Pyrrhonian critique of the Stoic theory of signs,w hich makes up acentral part of the second book of Sextus Empiricus' Outlines of .⁹⁰ In these two following chapters xand xi of book II, Sextus presents the Stoic distinctionb etween the recollective sign (σημεῖον ὑπομνηστικόν)a nd the indicative sign (σημεῖον ἐνδεικτικόν), casting doubtont he provability of the existenceofthe latter as amental representation of the inherentlyambiguous object of knowledge beings ignified (σημαινόμενον):⁹¹ 'Thus, since such plausible arguments are adduced both for there being signs and for there not being,wes hould no more sayt hat there are signs than thatt here are not.'⁹² Indicative signs here are also stronglyl inked with discursive thoughta st hey are defined as as ort of preposition (λεκτόν), which is 'ap re-antecedent statement in as oundc onditional, revelatory of the consequent.'⁹³ Mendelssohn'sc ritical account of signs as irreal and arbitrary abstractions of human reason resembles Sextus' sceptical evaluation of Stoic semiotics: […]; for without the aid of signs,man can scarcelyremovehimself one step from the sensual. In the same wayinwhich the first stepstowardrational knowledge must have been taken, the sciences ares till beinge xpanded and enriched by inventions;t his is whyt he invention of an ew scientific term is, at times,a ne vent of great importance. The man whof irst inventedt he word natured oes not seem to have made av ery great discovery.N evertheless,h is contemporaries were indebted to him for enabling them to confound the conjurerw ho showed them an apparition in the air,a nd to tell him that his trick was nothings upernatural, but an effect of nature.⁹⁴ Three facts immediatelysuggest thatMendelssohn was acquainted with this specific section of Sextus' Outlines of Pyrrhonism: (i) Mendelssohn possessed the 1718 folio edition of Sextus' writingsi nh is library, edited by Johann A. Fabricius on the basis of the original commentated edition of Henry Etienne from 1562.⁹⁵ (ii) In addition, we alsoknow that Mendelssohn was well familiar with Johann J. Bruckers Historia critica philosophiae,afive-volume work thathehad its first edition (1742 -1744) in his library⁹⁶ and also reviewed its supplemented appendixpublishedin1767inthe Allgemeine deutsche Bibliothek 11.1( 1770 philosophyS extus' critique of Stoic semiotics is discussed.⁹⁸ (iii) Mendelssohn also had in his possessionD ietrich Tiedemann's System der stoischen Philosophie,⁹⁹ wherea ttention, in the section 'Vond en Worten, und Ausdrücken der Gedanken' (143 -172),i sd rawn to SextusE mpiricus' sceptical account of Stoic semiotics and conception of language.¹⁰⁰

3D oubting Pythagoras' Golden Thigh
Let us now turn to an important passagefrom the first part of Jerusalem, concerning scepticism, that is generallyo verlooked: But should therebeanend to all disputeonaccountofthis?Must one never doubt principles?If so, men of the Pythagoreanschool could disputeforever how their teacher happened to come by his golden hip ('güldene Hüfte'), and no one would dare to ask: Did Pythagorasactuallyhavea golden hip?E very game has its laws, every contest its rules, according to which the umpired ecides.Ifyou want to win the stakeorcarry away the prize, youmust submit to the principles.But whoever wishes to reflect on the theory of games maycertainlyexamine the fundamentals. Just as in ac ourt of law.¹⁰¹ In this citation, Mendelssohn grapples with the vicious prejudiced critique of the reviewer of his Vorrede to Menasseh BenI srael'sR ettung der Juden in Göttingische Anzeigen von gelehrten Sachen, published on the 14 th of September 1782.T he central point of the dispute, from the perspective of the reviewer,w as that Mendelssohn calls into question the right to applyPrussian ecclesiastical law, predicated on Christian doctrines,¹⁰² to Jewish communities.¹⁰³ The reviewer does not refrain from exhibiting his negative sentimentstowards the Jewishpeople,¹⁰⁴ which he tries to validate with reference to anti-Judaic works such as JohannA .E isenmenger's Entdecktes Judenthum.¹⁰⁵ Thes udden dogmatic conclusion of the reviewer ('all this is new and harsh. First principles are negated, and all dispute comes to an end')¹⁰⁶ is exactly the point of departure for Mendelssohn. 'Die ersten Grundsätze' of the ecclesiastical authority by definition, as Mendelssohn argues, cannot be proven. He then goes on to implicitlyi dentify this attitude with the dogmatism of the Pythagorean school. Similarly,i nt he fourth part of Judah Halevi's Kuzari, the Pythagorean school of thoughti sr eferred to in the context of the impossibility for philosophyt or each a final verdict on metaphysical principles: Neither do two philosophers agreeonthis point, unless they be disciples of the same teacher. But Empedocles, Pythagoras,A ristotle, Plato, and manyothers entirelydisagreew ith each other.¹⁰⁷ Like Mendelssohn, Halevi points to the dogmatic and tribal natureo fd ifferent philosophical schools, whose disciples agree solelyw ith their own philosophicalm asters.Mendelssohn wasalso well acquainted with Diogenes Laërtius' Lives and Opinions of EminentP hilosophers,¹⁰⁸ wheret he myth of Pythagoras' golden thighi s mentioned.¹⁰⁹ With thatsaid, Iwant to advancethe argument thatMendelssohn'sdepiction is actuallyd erived from Johann M. Schröckh'sf ourth volume of his monumental work Christliche Kirchengeschichte (1777),w herew ef ind the following description: These arer umors and tales of the later Pythagoreans; manyo ft hem unreasonable and suspicious,manyofthem cannot even be traced back, with certainty,toaspecific time, and the seeming imitationo ft he evangelical history takesa wayi ts entiref ull worth and true usage.
[ … ]H e [i.e. Pythagoras] cured diseases of the bodyand the soul with magical sayings and was regarded because of his golden thigh to be Apollo. Had the Christians propagated similar tales,with so little believability,a bout the founders of their religion: then they would have been rightlyr idiculed. Apart from that,they were not yetentitled to designate Pythagorasasadeceiver, insofar as one cannot longer establish anythingi nr egards to this otherwise wise and virtuous man other than, at the utmost,the fact that he concealed agreat deal of his doctrinesand employed them against the large heap of artificial conceptions,which he might have perceiveda sn ecessary.But the Christianscould have then even further advancedtheir accusation of the credulity against his adorers.¹¹⁰ The parallels to Mendelssohn'sa ccount are striking:B oth descriptions exploit the myth of Pythagoras' thigh('güldene Hüfte')toexemplifythe problems of dogmatism. Schröckh tries to delineate the substantial differencebetween these implausible tales ('Erzählungen')about Pythagoras, passed on by the anti-Christian Porphyry,and the written transmission regardingt he figure of Jesus. He claims that if the Christians propagated such farfetched rumoursa bout the founders of their religion, they would have deserved much ridicule.M endelssohn, on the other hand,a ttempts to show that this is already, to some degree, the caseconcerning ecclesiastical authority ('Kirchenmacht')inthe Prussian Kingdom, since its 'fundamental principles' are adhered to dogmaticallyb yt he majorityo ft he Christian population without asking whether they are adequate and rational. If Mendelssohn reallyb ases his passage on Schröckh'sunfavourable characterisation of Pythagoreans,then his implicit statement against Prussian Christians is quite critical:They warrant mockery for theirgullibility ('Leichtgläubigkeit'). The wayM endelssohn illustrates the ludicrousness of the assessment of his reviewer is through the sceptical metaphor of ag ame in which rules can be arbitrarilym ade up. It should be noted that the correlation between sceptical doubt and the contingency of the predeterminedr ules of ag ame is not foreign to Jewish thought. Alreadyi nS imone Luzzatto'st reatise Socrates or on Human Knowledge (1651) we find av ery similar sceptical observation with recourse to the arbitrarilyd efined 'first positions' of ac hess game:

Summary
In conclusion, it can be said that Mendelssohn'sp erspective underlying the main apologetic contentions of his Jerusalem is aphilosophical, sceptical one: He assumes that religion cannot withstandt he scrutinizing assaults of philosophya nd for that reason attempts to secure his ownJ ewish belief as an on-theoretical religion based primarilyo nt he practical notion of ceremonial law. In order to ward off these threats,Mendelssohn has to compromise on avery central and common premise of traditional Jewishb elief: Thev iewt hat the Hebrew Bible manifests absolute truth. Hebrew Scripture can, at most,f acilitatet he attainment of common-sense knowledge regardingnatural religion. But Mendelssohn did not seem much discouraged by this fact,ashealso appreciated the aesthetic dimensions of poetical Biblical Hebrew,afield thatwas rapidlygaining ground in the second half of the eighteenth century in German-speakingE urope. At the same time,the critical analysis of Biblical textswas emerging as avery promisingmethod;itcertainlyalsohad an effect on Mendelssohn'sunconditioned refutation of bothMaimonidean as well as kabbalistic understanding of Scripture as speculative texts.
It hen turned to uncovering Mendelssohn'si ntricate usageo fn umerous philosophical and theological sources, which he seems to utilise for his sceptical account of language. It was demonstrated that Mendelssohn'scritical discussion takes for its starting point Cranz'se mployment of Pauline metaphor (2 Corinthians 3), through which he distinctively demarcates Judaism from Christianity by highlightingthe mediatory role of symboliclanguagetaken at face value. Mendelssohn then proceeds to philosophicallyd evelop his sceptical attitude towards language, drawingu pon the Platonic Schriftkritik in the Phaedrus. Subsequently,Iwent on to suggest that Mendelssohn'spreferred solution for the problem of dependency upon Hebrew Scripture, the ceremonial law, can also be linked to Plato'scritical analysis of the written word. As shown above, Mendelssohn had first-hand knowledge of Philo's De vita Moysis,to which he refers an umber of times in his Bi'ur. In this allegorical exegesis, Philo in-corporatedPlato's Schriftkritik and appraisal of the dynamic aliveness of spokenlanof the Maimonides Centref or Advanced Studies 2017,ed. Bill Rebiger( Berlin and Boston: De Gruyter, 2017): 114. Iwould liketothank Giuseppe Veltri for drawing my attention to this insightful passage of Simone Luzzatto. The first English translation of Socrates,aproject undertaken both by Giuseppe Veltri and Michela Torbidoni, is expected to be published soon.